


Hunger (It's Cold)

by Half_SubmergedinPurgatory



Series: TG Prompt Collection [4]
Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Gen, Hallucinations, Prompt Fic, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Torture, post-anteiku raid
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-17
Updated: 2016-09-17
Packaged: 2018-08-15 14:04:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8059180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Half_SubmergedinPurgatory/pseuds/Half_SubmergedinPurgatory
Summary: Between torture sessions, Eto tries to make Amon question his reality with words (or at least that's what she tells herself).Y'all can prompt me @ purgatoryandme.tumblr.com and see answered requests under the tag "drabbles".





	

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, I came to help you procrastinate. Besides the torture and trying to shape Amon into what she wanted, Eto also had some really deep conversations with him. She's surprised with the way he thinks.
> 
> (prompt from iterael on tumblr)

“It’s snowing today, Floppy.”   
  
A lilting voice floated down from the rafters to reach Koutarou’s ears. The tone was childish and tailored for his ears alone. Eto sounded so much like the children of his past…  
  
It was nauseating.  
  
“Were you raised to like the snow?”  
  
The origin point of the voice was difficult to track. It drifted left to right and in lazy little circles.   
  
Sometimes he was certain it was her kagune talking to him ( _he always thought it was when she was being honest_ ).   
  
“Ahaha, I don’t even know why I’m asking. It’s not like you can answer me anyway.”  
  
Not while the stitches remained in his mouth, Koutarou thought bitterly. Just to spite her, he emitted a muffled scream ( _a death threat, though his lips couldn’t form words_ ).  
  
“That’s why you’re my favourite.”  
  
The voice crooned ( _far too close for comfort_ ). Something leathery pulled at his lips and Koutarou became certain that it _**was**_ her kagune talking.   
  
His stitches popped out and blood ran like water down his parched throat.   
  
“I like it so much better when you talk…you know that you’re a character in one of my novels?”  
  
She murmured somewhere in the impenetrable darkness filling the room ( _had she torn out his eyes? Was he wearing a blindfold? Was it night? He never really knew_ ).   
  
“Shut up.”  
  
He wheezed, feeling his vocal chords vibrate against the air. They probably weren’t supposed to be exposed from his throat, were they?  
  
More blood ran down his throat and the sweet taste told him it wasn’t his. The skin of his neck stretched shut once again, but it never stopped feeling wrong.  
  
“I grew up h-a-t-i-n-g the snow.”  
  
Eto hummed dissonantly, three voices blending into one. Why she felt the need to hide from him constantly, he could never be sure. It hadn’t been like that in the beginning ( _she had been the only thing he could see back then_ ).   
  
“When it snowed, I knew I ran the risk of freezing to death. I’d fall asleep, then wake up in the morning with my face frozen to the pavement.”  
  
He hated the stories of her childhood. He didn’t like the way they echoed the kids in the academy.  
  
“Even with my watcher looking out for me, I knew winter was never safe. Nobody stays outside in the cold. I was always hungry.”  
  
Hungry like the orphans he’d grown up with, hungry like the gaunt children fighting and learning in the academy, hungry like Koutarou always was now-  
  
“If nobody was outside, you were safer than ever.”  
  
He choked out. Often, he responded contrarily to her out of spite. He never wanted to agree with a single thing she said.   
  
“I suppose so…nobody ever caught me in winter.”  
  
Her voice blended together with a sigh and a whisper of “Little Eto, you’re safe now.”  
  
What was he supposed to make of that? Was she caught in the summer, the spring, the fall? Who could ever catch a monster like her?  
  
“I still hate the snow~”  
  
She sang, suddenly right in his face, a kagune arm trailing threatening past his ears ( _he was sure his hearing was damaged and would only get worse the more times she pierced his eardrums…he didn’t ever heal right_ ).  
  
“Of course you do.”  
  
He bit out, swivelling his head to sink his teeth into the kagune touching him. It dissolved in his mouth, filling him with the sudden irrational fear that it would flow into his bloodstream and poison him.  
  
“You don’t like anything that covers the dirt on the streets.”  
  
He finished, instinctively stilling when he heard her laugh.   
  
“I suppose you’re right, Floppy. You always are.”  
  
She was gone and the window was open. He could _**smell**_ the snow.  
  
Eto was always taunting him with freedom.

* * *

“What does living mean to you, Floppy?”  
  
This time it wasn’t dark and Eto wasn’t hiding. Her naked body was reclined on the rafters above his head and he watched her carefully from his position ( _chained to a chair down below_ ).   
  
“Are you asking to find the most poetic way to kill me?”  
  
He spat out, straining his muscles against the chain ( _ignoring the harsh bite of the Arata armour into his torso_ ).   
  
“Maybe I want you to live before I kill you.”  
  
Eto responded, cryptic as ever. She was dangling only by her toes at this point, her breasts pulled down by gravity and reaching towards her throat.   
  
He wished that they’d suffocate her.   
  
“What do you think I’m doing right now?”  
  
He growled, unable to understand her riddles and unwilling to try. She laughed again and disappeared back into the rafters, tossing a simple,   
  
“I wouldn’t know.”  
  
Over her shoulder to haunt him.

* * *

“I’m not a maternal person, but don’t you think Kaneki Ken is a little like my child?”  
  
Koutarou started terribly at the sudden intrusion of his privacy. Eto hadn’t spoken to him since the hallucinations started.   
  
He wasn’t used to people interrupting his time with Eyepatch.  
  
“Who…ah, yes, the half-ghoul boy. Wouldn’t he actually be Rize Kamishiro’s child?”  
  
He wondered aloud as he tried to pull together his scattered thoughts. Eyepatch was rearranging Koutarou’s body, forcing him into a sitting position, and chaining him back to his chair.  
  
Right, he was supposed to be chained to his chair.  
  
When had he started feeling as though he wasn’t?  
  
“Rize? She doesn’t have a maternal bone in her body. He’s mine if I adopt him, right?”  
  
Eto questioned, stepping into his field of view. Her cloak skimmed across the ground and against her bare feet ( _kicking up dust and…rust?)_.   
  
“If I love him, he’s mine, right? He’s always wanted to be loved.”  
  
Eyepatch was waving his hands in front of Koutarou’s eyes, signalling something desperately. He pointed up to the window that Koutarou had tried to reach many times in the past. He pointed at Eto’s cloaked form. He gestured to himself.  
  
“ _ **Eat.**_ ”  
  
Eyepatch whispered, both eyes shining a brilliant (i _mpossible_ ) shade of red.  
  
“ _ **Feed her secrets and then eat**_.”  
  
“A secret?”  
  
Koutarou asked out loud, drawing Eto’s attention to him sharply.  
  
“What do you know that I don’t?”  
  
She purred. Koutarou felt a twinge of surprise. What didn’t Eto know, other than love and life?  
  
Eyepatch placed his hands on Koutarou’s jaw and forced his mouth open. His fingers rested on his tongue, pushing down, and words fell from his lips:  
  
“The only _ **love**_ a child of yours would know is death. It’s the only thing you could give him that no one else would.”  
  
Eto’s eyes gleamed unnaturally in the darkness. He had always heard that green was the colour of envy ( _was that was what shone in them now?_ ).  
  
She touched his face, right over Eyepatch’s hand.  
  
She tilted his head, meeting his gaze directly.  
  
“How useful you are…”  
  
A voice behind her murmured as a red tree rose from the ground. For a moment, the flesh of her arm was replaced by a lovely green apple.  
  
“Eat.”  
  
Eyepatch’s words slithered into his ears like a snake in the garden. Eyepatch had always guided him to knowledge, hadn’t he?   
  
…  
  
Koutarou ate.  
  
Koutarou escaped.  
  
Eto’s laughter followed him out the window.


End file.
